The act or practice of speaking badly about someone when they are not present; gossip and slander directed at absent people.
From 'backbite' + the gerund/participle suffix '-ing'. As a noun, this term names the habitual practice itself, becoming especially prominent in moral and ethical discourse since medieval times.
Backbiting appears with remarkable frequency in Shakespeare—he understood that the drama of betrayal through words was as powerful as any physical action, making it one of literature's enduring themes because it touches something true about human nature.
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